Awaken
by paradigm se7en
Summary: we've always assumed Phoenix would rise from Her ashes with flame and fury, setting the sky alight with fiery, icandescent wings as she reclaimed her birthright of rebirth. But what if her flames sputtered out before they ever got the chance to burn?


**Title:** Awaken  
  
**Author:** seraph  
  
**Character(s):** Jean, mostly (and a few lines from ye olde Scott and Professor Xavier.)  
  
**Timeline:**Post X2 (well, maybe a few days after the end of the movie, if you really want to be specific)  
  
**Rating:** PG  
  
**Disclaimer:** Insert yer standard disclaimer here about not owning any of those wonderful, wonderful characters which the movie failed to characterise properly. _*ducks*_  
  
**Summary:**_ It's been assumed many a time that the Phoenix would rise from Her ashes - in this case, her watery grave - with flame and fury, setting the sky alight with fiery, icandescent wings as she reclaimed her birthright of rebirth.   
  
But what if her flames sputtered out before they ever got the chance to burn?_  
  
**Notes:** two things.  
  
one: This is basically a long drabble, or a short one-shot story thing, depending on how you look at it. I'm still playing around with making a longer story out of this, but at this moment, this is all there is.   
  
two: I've tried writing movieverse fanfics before, but the bulk of them are still lounging about on my hard drive right now; this is my first attempt to actually throw something I've written (for movieverse-X/X2) out into the big, wide world. Besides which, I'm not all that adept at sinking my teeth into the character - not as much as I'd like, anyway. Bear that in mind, and have mercy as you read through the thing.   
  
PS: Enjoy! (...even if it does come accross a bit lame at times. And sensible Critiquing will be highly appreciated. Not to mention rewarded with chocolate chip cookies and brownies, too. ;))

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**Awaken**  
  
_Cold.  
  
So Cold._  
  
It is the first thought echoing blankly through her mind as her eyes open to a murky gloom of blue and black and shimmering light somewhere up beyond her reach. She reaches up all the same, but the light is far, far away, and her strength is but little.   
  
The fact that she is also underwater, a cold sorrowful blue-black underwater at that, does not escape her mind; indeed, she is forced to acknowledge its presence mere microseconds after her eyes start to burn and sting. She gasps, and breathes in what seems like a lungful of cold, cold water that not only freezes her aching throat, but runs up her nose and seems to desire passage to her brain and lull her into an everlasting numbness to be forgotten evermore to life and hope.   
  
She cannot allow it.   
  
She will **not** allow it.   
  
For she has looked into the abyss and she has seen what fires burn in the celestial forge, and she has peered into the depths of infinity and she has learned of what she is; she knows that it is not her time yet; she knows that it will not be her time for a long, long time to come.   
  
She also knows that she has already said her goodbyes and farewells, hasty and unbidden though they might have been, and she knows that the one she loves is slowly killing himself with a backbreaking burden of guilt and sorrow and self-hatred and the one who believes he loves her never thought himself alive anyway, but he's drowning himself all the same in his own little personal hell.   
  
It doesn't help that the woman inside of her is drained and tired and cold and alone and has forsaken herself of hope, that she does not want to return only to lose everything all over again as she has convinced herself she will; yet the creature that burns inside her will not let her forsake herself thus, for Phoenix burns forever, Her flames cannot be extinguished.   
  
_Gotta…hold…on…_She whispers silently, wondering if the woman speaks to the firebird, or vice versa.   
  
_But…so…Hard…_  
  
After what seems like forever, the tired woman finally closes her eyes. But not because she is giving up, oh no, she tells herself – she will not go that easily into the grave yet. But how can she not, a voice deep within her asks, tired with this agony of waiting forever between dying and undying, how can she **not**?  
  
The murky blue gloom has shifted in the meantime, and she can almost swear that the light seems closer, and right there, she lazily points a finger, weary half smile on her cold lips – there, and isn't that the shimmering, rippling surface of the lake?  
  
But it is still too far away, she tells herself now, too far away by a few thousand lightyears, and she cannot go on any longer, her breath is too weary and cold and weak, even now she tries to breathe a ragged sharp breath and ice cold water soaks her, drowns her and seeps into her very being with every attempt. Like a lover's caress, perhaps, but so much more violent and forced; aggressive and dominant – less a lover than a violator.   
  
_'It's JEAN, danmit!'_  
  
_'Scott, please, have reason…'_  
  
Her flames are dying out, she tells herself, all but giving in to the tired voice which only seeks closure; she cannot go any further. Quite a dilemma. And so, somewhere in a nightmare abyss between the conscious and unconscious worlds, in the nether that fills the void between life and death, she paces from the light to the dark, and waits…  
  
_'God, it's her! Can't you SEE that it's HER!!!'_  
  
_'Scott, for the love of God, man, it's too late already …don't! SCOTT!'_  
  
Her ears discern a dull splash somewhere but she cannot bring herself to notice. A hand grips her from behind, a strong and powerful hand, and pulls her up, but she cannot bring herself to move. She senses that she has broken through that veil of water which she had so longingly looked at from the depths.   
  
_'Please.'_  
  
But it does her no good, this realisation. It brings her no relief to know that she has been saved and redeemed.  
  
_'Please, pleaseplease don't do this to me…not AGAIN…'_  
  
For her lips are cold and her skin is clammy.   
  
_'Please.'_  
  
And she does not know if she can burn any longer.  
  
_'Come back.'_

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End file.
